Monthly Archives: July 2012

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This isn’t the first time anyone’s ever used long exposure photography to make compositions with light, but Jasper Geenhuizen (Netherlands) is doing some of the best I’ve seen. Strong colors, and perfect set up and location. This is how you do it right. There’s no gimmick to these either- I would dig these pictures with or without the light work. They emit a damp, nocturnal atmosphere that’s not easy to reproduce. In Geenhuizen’s words, “Everybody can make light graffiti, but it is truly art to be able to combine the light with the place.” Hope to see much more from this guy going forward.

Scott King is bringing some interesting ideas to the table concerning celebrity culture, social revolution, and Globalism. He often includes humorous elements in his work, which is hardly ever a bad thing. King has produced conceptual graphic design, print design, and installation work (large and small) with equal skill and insight. From a piece depicting Ulrike Meinhof as the Mona Lisa, to punk flyers, sculpture, and altered magazine covers, King is doing it. And he’s doing it well.

Dutch painter Joram Roukes’ large scaled oil paintings of collaged images bring together moments of abstraction, figuration, and pop iconography together to create dynamic mutating and morphing figures. His imagery refers to the moral dilemmas one may find himself in, viewing today’s western society. Through experience by participation Joram Roukes reflects not necessarily on an opinion on society’s flaws in his work, but rather observes and reports on typical western phenomena, leaving judgement up to the viewer, who thereby, establish their own position in these matters. (via)

Brazilian illustrator and comics author Pedro Franz fills his work to the brim with color, characters, and textual elements. And it’s all happening at once. Before you can take in a single expression or brush stroke, you are swallowed whole. I don’t mind. But when you do recover from the original onslaught of energy, a unique style of narrative is revealed. More images of Franz’s work after the jump, and you can check out his comic, Promises of Love to Strangers While Waiting for the End of the World, right here.

As part of our ongoing partnership with Feature Shoot, Beautiful/Decay is sharing Greta Rybus’ interview with Photographer Anton Kusters.

Anton Kusters is a Belgium-based photographer specializing in long-term projects. In 2011, he published his first photobook on the Yakuza, the Japanese organized crime families, that he photographed for two years.

Tell us about your Yakuza project.
‘YAKUZA is a personal visual account of the life inside an inaccessible subculture: A traditional Japanese crime family that controls the streets of Kabukicho, in the heart of Tokyo, Japan. Through 10 months of negotiations with the Shinseikai, my brother Malik and I became one of the only Westerners ever to be granted this kind of access to the closed world of Japanese organized crime.

‘With a mix of photography, film, writing and graphic design, I try to share not only their complex relationship to Japanese society, but also the personal struggle of being forced to live in two different worlds at the same time; worlds that often have conflicting morals and values. It turns out not to be a simple black versus white relationship, but most definitely one with many, many, many shades of grey.’

Australian artist Damien Kamholtz recently opened Boats Like Feathers, an exhibition of new works at Art House Gallery in Melbourne. From the gallery’s website:

Boats Like Feathers brings together the child and adult in a soft and vibrant world of narrative and metaphor evoked through Damien Kamholtz’s deeply layered and nostalgic work, rich with a story unique to each viewer if they are willing to take part in the journey.

More images after from the show after the jump, and you can check out a video of the artist in the studio here.

Alejandro Cardenas, based in NYC, creates watercolor and guache works in which stark, flat figurative elements blend seamlessly with abstract flourishes and branches of washed out color. Set amidst a deep black background, this work stands out well. Too often, water based media is used as a generator of quaint atmosphere; whimsical drawings that take up very little space on paper or canvas. Cardenas’ work, conversely, is bold and fully composed where others may have defaulted into paltry understatement.

Michael Bevilacqua current exhibit at Gering &Lopez Gallery in NYC showcases a single, monumental painting titled An Ideal For Living; a canvas that the artist has spent more than the past year painting. As with a number of Bevilacqua’s works, the title references a particular source of music, in this case the 1978 debut album by the post-punk rock band Joy Division. The band became an obsession for Bevilacqua, so much so that the painting grew along with his focus, consuming his attention and mirroring his state of mind. Each song, each lyric began taking on particular significance for Bevilacqua, who found many parallels to his own life and reflected his outlook on his surroundings. An Ideal For Living in fact created the rhythm of the artist’s life over the past year, further loosening his painting style and bringing about a series of work that he refers to as ‘the New Dis Order.’ Clearly diaristic in nature, the 30’ painting features an eclectic mix of color, text, visual styles and process. As rich as one would expect a yearlong work to be, the painting is also nuanced, with areas of sharpness and clarity layered upon washes of color and moody hues. Juxtaposed against this singular outpouring, other new works take a different approach, becoming extremely minimal and hauntingly symbolic, drained of color or highly textured.